Trump Team Worries Helsinki Disaster Will Boost Mueller Probe; Kremlin Praises Trump-Putin Meeting As White House Remains Silent; Moscow Puts Its Own Spin On Trump-Putin Meeting; Mom Loses Her Three Kids, Nine Family Members In Boat Accident; Interview with Sen. Richard Blumenthal; Did the Helsinki Summit Strengthen Mueller's Case? Putin to be Invited to Visit the White House with Disapproval from Lawmakers; Roseanne Barr Circulates Videos Discussing her Firing from the ABC Network; Tornado Threats Blanket Several States; Does Trump Derangement Syndrome Actually Exist? Aired 8-9a ET

Aired July 21, 2018 - 08:00 ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[08:00:00]

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- the tightly scripted comedy, the impact gives eight rawness of a spontaneity the audience is really seeking I think in the comedy they watch these days.

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VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: The original series, "The History of Comedy" airs Sunday night 10:00 p.m. Eastern right here on CNN.

CHRISTI PAUL, CNN ANCHOR: It's 8:00, welcome to your weekend here. After a week spent facing heavy criticism over the Trump-Putin summit in Helsinki, the White House is now apparently worried that the meeting may have played right into Robert Mueller's hands.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: Now before the Helsinki summit, the president's team was riding a wave of declining public support for the Mueller probe. Now the president's performance may have emboldened Mueller.

PAUL: This is happening as the Defense and State Department leaders are defending plans for another Putin summit, this time in Washington.

BLACKWELL: CNN White House reporter, Sarah Westwood, is live in Berkeley Heights, New Jersey near the president's golf club. Sarah, good morning to you. The White House is now having to defend this decision to have a second meeting in just a few months.

SARAH WESTWOOD, CNN REPORTER: That's right, Victor. This is coming as President Trump's legal team is worried that any advantage they had gained before the Helsinki summit was erased by President Trump's widely criticized performance alongside Vladimir Putin.

Because at least in the court of public penalties, Trump's team have started to turn the tide in his favor. Polls had shown declining public support for Special Counsel Robert Mueller in a recent Justice Department inspector report had raised questions of potential bias among a select few at the FBI.

But sources tell our colleagues, Dana Bash and Gloria Borger, that Trump's attorneys now fear that Trump's deferential treatment of Putin as well as the indictment last week of 12 Russian intelligence officers accused of conducting cyberattacks during the election on Americans in order to interfere with the process could start to blunt the momentum that they had created through their campaign of relentless attacks on Mueller.

Obviously, this all comes against the backdrop of President Trump and his attorneys negotiating with Special Counsel Robert Mueller over the prospect of doing an interview. It is not a good time for the White House to have a weakened hand in the court of public penalties as well as facing down this Putin meeting as Trump's attorneys try to avoid an interview altogether or at least severely limit the scope of one, if it occurs -- Victor.

PAUL: So, Lynn Sweet, Washington bureau chief of the "Chicago Sun Times" is with us now as well as Tim Naftali, CNN presidential historian and professor of history and public policy at New York University, and Michael Zeldin, CNN legal analyst and former federal prosecutor with us. Thank you all for being with us. We appreciate it.

Lynn, straight to you. Does what we are seeing with this Helsinki summit, does it undermine the president and embolden the Mueller investigation?

LYNN SWEET, WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF, "CHICAGO SUN TIMES": Can I say, yes and no? There is the court of public opinion and then a very methodical investigation that Mueller is conducting. In which case, the Helsinki summit, I don't think it's any more boldening or spying than he has right now.

Just look at the indictment of the 12 Russian agents days before Trump went to speak to President Putin. That was a delivery to take with him to Helsinki. So, in the court of public opinion, I am still skeptical as to whether or not in terms of the base.

The Republican based voters of Helsinki makes much of a difference to look for in the unfolding days is whether Republicans in Congress, particularly the leadership find out that this is finally the last straw, one of the last straws, we are far from the last, that does cause a rift between Trump and Republican leadership.

We did see McConnell and Ryan speak out, with Putin coming again to Washington. If that trip unfolds, I think it will put more pressure on Republican leaders to say, what's going on here? Will there be people in the room?

If are you going fine tune and develop whatever you talked about in those two hours, will this be done in a way that people know it's going on and every day that passes, is a day closer to the November midterm elections.

PAUL: So, Tim, we have reporting out of Russia this morning that they are now saying there is a potential agreement on a Ukraine referendum, in addition to what they've already said that they've talked about cybercrime in this Helsinki meeting.

That they talked about military security, a possible deal with Syria, and yet, we are hearing nothing from this White House. What do you make of the fact that it seems President Trump is allowing Russia to dictate the conversation and the consequences from it at this point?

[08:05:08] TIM NAFTALI, CNN PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: Well, Christi, I'm not sure who is allowing whom. The Russians are not 12 feet tall. They make mistakes. What they're doing at the moment is they're controlling the narrative about the meeting and the effect of that is that they are actually humiliating President Trump.

PAUL: So, why is he letting him do it? Why didn't he come out and say more?

NAFTALI: I think the last week was additional evidence that President Trump is not particularly strong. He's not a particularly strong foreign leader. He's very -- he's a battering ram with our own allies, but with adversaries, he allows them to dictate the narrative.

Look what he has done with North Korea. So, I think the Russians are making interesting gamble. I suspect our intelligence community is trying to figure out why they're making the gamble right now. Because after all, if you keep in mind, what does Putin want?

Putin wants a free hand in Syria and the agreement that the Russians say was reached is an agreement that is contrary to the basic policy of most of the United States government. Why would the Russians be admitting that now? It's really interesting.

I suspect they have figure3d out that President Trump needs better optics. That's the reason why President Trump has invited Putin to come here just before the mid-terms. This has nothing to do with warding the Russians for a good agreement.

The Russians have Trump exactly where they'd like to have him, which is that he needs them more than they need him. So, I think what they've done is they've doubled down to try to set up some kind of arrangements, and knowing the president needs something positive to come out of it.

This has been a terrible week for American foreign policy, but I suspect the Russians may have overplayed their hands this past week. They have humiliated Trump and he may react badly to that.

PAUL: Michael, I wanted to ask you and listen with you to something that Sean Turner, a former director of communications for U.S. National Intelligence said last night with Wolf Blitzer when he was asked about this second summit, or the second meeting with Putin here in the U.S. Here's what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHAWN TURNER, FORMER DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATION FOR U.S. NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: For the president to invite Vladimir Putin here during that time puts a lot of stress on the intelligence community. I'm also told that one of the things that he is interested is having Vladimir Putin here during the big military parade that he's talked about. So, I think that the president is kind of focused on his own interests with regard to this.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL: Michael, what do you think about that reporting he is citing that the president wants to bring Putin here, which would be in November for this military parade, which in itself has been a controversy?

MICHAEL ZELDIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Right. So, if I were given a vote, I'd say, let's not hold that military parade. If I was giving it a second vote, I would say, let's not have Vladimir Putin at that military parade. I'm not sure what the purpose of that is.

I don't think from a PR stand point, it's all that helpful to the president. If he's trying to craft a legal narrative that there is no collusion coordination in the past between Putin and myself and my campaign that makes me beholden to him. So, I think the optics of that does not help him in his legal efforts.

PAUL: OK. So, Lynn, what do you make of that assertion that the president wants to do this during military parade, what would the interpretation be there from the president's part?

SWEET: Intention would be from my political and psychological analysis here is that President Trump is and always is a reality show star and this would be a great special. I say that in seriousness, because we know there are so many inconsistencies.

On one hand, President Trump is proud of the money he is saving by not having joint military exercises with South Korea that he's willing to spend millions on a parade in Washington, D.C. that is really for one man, himself.

There is no public demand for this parade. If you have Putin there, I think it's very risky before the midterm elections because it will force every Republican running in a tight race to take a stand on the parade.

This is a good use of money. Why is our number one enemy invited to this place of honor to review the troops? If the answer is to show how strong America is militarily, you don't need a parade in Washington, D.C. to show that.

So, it's risky, it's expensive. Trump always likes to be counting the bill, as if he was in private industry and proud to say cost cutting. So, it runs opposite to his own message. It will be framed very much as just some kind of self-adulation, more than any reasonable execution of policy.

[08:10:07] PAUL: Tim, how do you couple that assertion about the military parade with what we have learned in the last 24 hours. You know, Microsoft executive, Tom Burke, revealed that this security forum this week the last 48 hours happened on Thursday, that Russian intel operatives had attempted to hack into online accounts of three different congressional campaigns going into the November midterms.

I mean, he's talking about bringing Putin to the U.S. at that time. Historically, when you look back, would that ever have been something that any president would have considered?

NAFTALI: You know, the kremlin has not had as useful an asset in the White House since Vice President Henry Wallace was a conveyer belt for Kremlin disinformation in World War II. I think it is appalling that the president of the United States is allowing Putin to basically dictate the narrative of our country's policy towards Europe and towards Syria.

What is striking to me is that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo instead of getting ahead of the story today, is talking about a freedom, a religious freedom summit next week. That might be very important. I'm not saying that isn't.

I'm just saying that today the secretary of state should reassert America's privacy in dictating and describing its foreign policy in Europe and the Middle East. That's not happening.

PAUL: All righty. And I wanted to ask you, Michael, lastly about this information that's coming out about the hacking of these three campaigns. The fact that it was an attempt at hacking, but the fact that it is still ongoing. What does the president do at this point? What do Republicans do at this point? With the president who seems to still embrace Putin.

ZELDIN: Well, I think there are a couple things from a purely legal stand point because I have no sort of political opinion about this. But the question is in the legal context, did the Russians hack? We know that Mueller says yes in his indictment.

Did the Trump Organization coordinate? And is there a basis to believe that that relationship still is ongoing, which explains why Putin and Trump behave that is they do towards one another.

The ongoing hacking campaign gives the president an opportunity to essentially correct the perceived errors of Helsinki and say, Mr. Putin, this can't go on anymore and make stand that supports his legal proposition that there was never collusion in the first instance.

And now that I've seen it first hand, I'm going to put an end to it. If he doesn't respond, you know, aggressively about that then again it feeds the legal narrative there was some coordination.

There is some ongoing fear that Putin has negative information on him, which is why he is not responding negatively. So, from a legal standpoint, there is lots of opportunity for the president, and lots of danger if he doesn't act, you know, sort of aggressively to put an end to this.

PAUL: All right. Lynn Sweet, Tim Naftali, and Michael Zeldin, always appreciate all of your insights. Thank you for being here.

BLACKWELL: This morning, Russia is putting a spin on President Trump's one-on-one meeting with Vladimir Putin. Let's talk more about it. They call it better than super, revealing that they talked about Syria, Ukraine, military security.

And right now, we are getting all of our news about what happened in that room between the two men from Moscow, since the White House hasn't said much of anything about what went on in that meeting.

CNN senior international correspondent, Sam Kiley, is live from Moscow. Sam, tell us more about how the Russians are characterizing this meeting, and how they are actually moving forward on some of the agreements they've said were reached in that one-on-one.

SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, they're absolutely delighted as you said, though, you were quoting Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, a man normally not given to effusions of any kind, reportedly was high fiving his staff at the presidential palace in Helsinki after the meeting and after the press conference between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.

Subsequent to that, the Russians have been steadily almost working if you'd like as a PR branch for Donald Trump by trying to reinforce his position that there were worthwhile discussions that were not controversial.

So, initially, the Ministry of Defense here said that there were talks about the talks of the future, SALT Treaty, which expires in about 18 months, that will be a renewal of an arms reduction treaty. Pretty uncontroversial there.

[08:15:13] Also talking about cooperating on terror and on cyber, a little bit ironic there. Most people have not remarked upon it, but of course, it's been cyber hacking that has been at the center of this allegations over efforts to influence the elections.

Then they have started to leak about an agreement or an alleged agreement about possible repatriation of Syrian refugees. Those refugees outside of Syria, back into that country.

That is if they go back into areas, though, under Russian stroked Syrian regime control, completely contrary to existing American policy in the region. So, an opportunity for them to make Trump look as though he may be getting ahead of his own administration.

And there have been hints that the White House has since put back on that Donald Trump was going to consider whether or not he would support a referendum on the future of the Donbas region, which is the Russian influence occupied part of Ukraine.

So, they are leaking out details, very much from their own perspective. Taking control of the whole story. One thing to add, very interesting, indeed, the European Union have been accused overnight by Donald Trump in tweets of manipulating currency.

That's just the sort of thing that the Russians really love to hear, yet more friction between the European Union, that big bear and the United States, their greatest rival.

BLACKWELL: All right. Sam Kiley for us there in Moscow. Sam, thanks so much.

PAUL: All right. This is a very brave woman here that you are going to hear from, the mom who lost nine family members, including all three of her own children in that deadly Duck boat accident. We are taking you live to Branson, Missouri. You will hear more from her and about the investigation.

BLACKWELL: Plus, a prominent Houston doctor shot and killed. Now police are looking for his killer. Coming up, that doctor's connection to former President George H.W. Bush.

PAUL: Roseanne Barr is back with what she claims is the real reason her show was cancelled after she posted that racist tweet.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROSEANNE BARR, COMEDIAN: My show was cancelled before even one advertiser pulled out and I was labelled a racist. Why you ask? Well, the answer is simple.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[08:21:32]

BLACKWELL: This morning, two people injured in that Missouri Duck boat crash are out of the hospital.

PAUL: This is happening as authorities announced the identities of the 17 people who were killed when that tourist boat capsized in really hurricane-like conditions. That happened Thursday.

CNN's Kaylee Hartung is in Branson, Missouri right now. What are you hearing today that's going on there, Kaylee, and talk to us about this mom who is actually talking, which I think is surprising everybody.

KAYLEE HARTUNG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I think it is, Christi. At this time, four survivors from the tragedy here at Table Rock Lake remain hospitalized, as you mentioned. The 17 victims have all been identified.

Now 36 hours removed from a tragedy has that shaken this community. This is a popular vacation destination, this area of the Ozarks. None of these victims were actually from this area. They were all visiting here from out of town.

Yet last night you saw a tremendous show of support from this community. A vigil outside the ride the Duck's office, in which there was really a sense from people of this is Branson, when you come here, you become a part of our family. You mentioned this stunning story we have learned of in that -- of those on board, the 31 people on board that vessel, 11 were members of one family, the Coleman family from Indiana.

Nine members of that family died, and we are hearing from the first survivor, one of the members of the Coleman family, listen to the experience Tia Coleman described from her hospital bed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TIA COLEMAN, LOST FAMILY IN BOAT ACCIDENT: There is big huge waves, choppy, everything started getting, like, hey, this is a little too much. Then it got really choppy and big swells of water started coming into the boat. Then a really huge wave swept over.

When that wave swept over, the last thing I heard my sister-in-law yell is grab the baby. My head pushed up to the top of the water. I lost control. I didn't have control of anybody. I know it wasn't, but it felt like I struggled for at least ap hour, but it was probably like 10 minutes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARTUNG: Among the nine family members, Tia Coleman lost, her three children. She says she believes when the boat is recovered from the bottom of this lake where it currently sits, 80-feet deep. She says she believes all of the life vests will be found on that boat because they were never instructed to grab them. She says the crew explained to them where the vest could be found but never told them to put them on.

That boat as I mentioned still at the bottom of this lake. The recovery of that vessel will be an important part of this investigation, as we'll be talking to survivors and witnesses like Tia Coleman for the NTSB -- Christi, Victor.

PAUL: Kaylee Hartung, thank you so much. Police in Houston today, by the way, are looking for the suspect who shot and killed a cardiologist, a cardiologist who treated former President George H.W. Bush.

BLACKWELL: Investigators say Dr. Mark Hausknecht was shot and killed Friday while riding his bicycle to work. According to police, the doctor was riding in one direction when he was shot by a suspect who was riding in the other direction. Police don't know if the shooting was targeting this doctor or random or caused by road rage.

Still to come, Russia, controlling the narrative about what happened in Helsinki. Now the president's legal team is worried his behavior may embolden the special counsel's Russia investigation. Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal joins us next.

[08:25:12] PAUL: Also, 20 million people, yes, 20 million of us under threat of tornadoes this weekend. The same system that caused all of the damage that you are seeing here in Iowa is working its way across the southeast. We have a live report for you. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:30:00]

VICTOR BLACKWELL, HOST: Welcome back, I'm Victor Blackwell. CNN is learning that the president's legal team is becoming increasingly concerned that the Helsinki summit could strengthen Special Council Bob Mueller's investigation. Now Russia tells its own version of what was discussed now shaping a narrative which has yet to be confirmed by the White House.

Here with me to discuss, democratic Senator from Connecticut, Richard Blumenthal. Senator, good morning to you.

REP. RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, (D) CONNECTICUT: Good morning to you; thank you for having me.

BLACKWELL: Let's start there with your assessment. Does the president's or has the president's performance in Helsinki and since Helsinki do you believe strengthened Bob Mueller's investigation and weakened the president as a sympathetic character as he characterizes the investigation as a witch hunt.

BLUMENTHAL: The special counsel's investigation very importantly will be based on the facts and the law. So his hand and his position in court is going to be dependent on his continuing methodical and meticulous fact finding and investigation. But it certainly undercuts the president's position in the court of public opinion as has been mentioned. And the reason is quite simply, Putin made Donald Trump his patsy; his puppet.

He made a fool of Donald Trump. Vladimir Putin is not just any foreign leader; he is the autocratic dictator of a foreign power that is an enemy of the United States and that attacked the United States. The special counsel brought indictment just last Friday that accused 12 of Putin's foreign operatives, his spies of conducting an attack on this country -- interfering in our election.

And the special counsel investigation, in effect, is investigating Donald Trump's possible collaboration or conspiracy with Putin, his agents. And so to make Donald Trump look like a fool on the world stage certainly undercuts his position in this investigation.

BLACKWELL: OK, so let's in that context now talk about the announcement that came up this week, late this leak that Putin will be coming to the U.S. at the invitation of the president sometime in the fall. We heard from the office of Majority Leader McConnell also from Nancy Pelosi's office over in the House, that he will not be welcome to visit Congress. But should there be something more than simply saying you cannot come here, that Congress should do or can do in opposition to this visit that's coming in the next few months.

BLUMENTHAL: If anything, Putin ought to be indicted, not invited to the United States. Donald Trump is treading on exceedingly dangerous ground. His own National Intelligence Director, Dan Coates warned the country that we are in a pre-9/11 moment because of the ongoing attack, pervasive and ongoing attack on this nation from the Russians. So it's more than just about Donald Trump's ego and what happens to Putin while he's here. It's about the national security of the United States and the most insidious part of this visit is that it will enable the Russians to gather more intelligence and potentially threaten our national security.

BLACKWELL: But Senator, is there anything more --

BLUMENTHAL: As well to further humiliate Donald Trump.

BLACKWELL: Is there anything more that Congress can do than say, he won't be invited here? Should the Congress as it has in the last couple of weeks passed a resolution saying that, you know, what we saw with NATO, we saw in opposition to the potential of sending former ambassador to Moscow to be questioned, there should be something formal that Congress has in opposition to this invitation?

BLUMENTHAL: We're considering what we can do formally. A resolution is one option and perhaps we ought to move forward with it. I think my Republican colleagues should join us in condemning this potential visit. Donald Trump likes to operate without intelligence but he has humiliated the intelligence community. He had refused to tell many of his closest advisers, apparently the full extent of what happened in that Helsinki meeting. A repetition of that kind of meeting would be a debacle again for this country and any time the two of them, Putin and Trump, are in the same room, our country is the less safe.

[08:35:00]

So a resolution, some kind of public statement bipartisan, and I hope my Republican colleagues will join this effort. The time has come for Republicans and Democrats to join together and I hope that my Republican colleagues will step up and speak out.

BLACKWELL: All right. You mentioned the ambiguity of what happened in that meeting between President Putin and President Trump and, of course the other two people there were interpreters. Let me read the latest tweet from a minority leader in the senate there, Chuck Schumer.

"Asking to interview the interpreter is not a request that is made lightly, but when unverified news at a closed door meeting is coming out of Moscow, and the Trump Administration keeps changing their story, serious steps must be to be taken to uncover the truth."

Are you not creating dangerous precedent here by calling for the interview or the testimony of that interpreter that years down the line, a suspicious Republican Congress can call for the notes from an interpreter of a Democratic president?

BLUMENTHAL: Well, that's a very good question. The dangerous precedent has been created by Donald Trump having a two-hour meeting between himself and Putin without anyone present, leads to the request for at least the translator's notes. But what's most important I think is for Donald Trump's national security team to come to brief congress to give us the facts about what occurred for Donald Trump, himself, to tell the American people.

The narrative is coming from the Russian news agency, TASS, rather than from the President of the United States. He has weakened this country, put in effect his own interests before the country's, and so the resort to having the translator is not our first choice. The national security team at the present, if properly informed, could come to Congress and present testimony.

Mike Pompeo is coming this coming Wednesday, but the entire team ought to come.

BLACKWELL: Senator, I got a few seconds left, I want to ask you about legislation that's moving through the senate. This is Senator's Rubio and Van Hollen. Their Deter Act that they introduced a few months ago. It's now gaining support the president's performance in Helsinki adding about nine bipartisan cosponsors late this week. And it would essentially tie sanctions against Russia for any potential future interference in an election to the assessment of the director of national intelligence, but encroaching on the president's powers there.

Do you think that the president will sign this and, if not, do you realistically think that there is going to be a veto-proof majority in the senate and the house that will take these powers away from the president and enact them automatic ally based on the DNI reports?

BLUMENTHAL: Great question. First of all, I'm a supporter of this legislation. I think additional sanctions are absolutely necessary but the president has failed to enforce the sanctions that we overwhelmingly passed earlier this year. His refusal to enforce those sanctions is absolutely reprehensible. They passed 97-2. I would predict that these sanctions will also pass. There will be a veto proof majority and there is strong bipartisan support as well for moving forward on cyber to use our resources to stop the continuing Russian attack.

I can't be more emphatic. This country must go on the offensive in cyber to use the cyber command and our resources to cripple and penetrate those attacks on our country.

BLACKWELL: Senator, I have a few seconds left and I apologize for the interruption there. But you think in the waning months before mid- term election, you will get enough Republicans and enough Democrats even in those Trump states who will be willing to vote over a presidential veto to try to take some of the powers away from the president?

BLUMENTHAL: If the Republican leadership addresses this challenge and puts this measure on the floor, I believe the votes will be there because my hope is and it's more a hope than a prediction, Republicans will meet this challenge. They must stand up and speak out and now is the time for action, because Vladimir Putin understands only action. Action speaks louder than words.

BLACKWELL: All right, Senator Richard Blumenthal, thanks so much for being with us this morning. BLUMENTHAL: Thank you.

CHRISTI PAUL: Well, Rosanne Barr is back with a second video in two days and she says she knows the real reason she was fired from her ABC show and if you ask her, it was not for that racist tweet.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:40:00]

PAUL: Forty-four minutes past the hour right now, Rosanne Barr is back. She has a new explanation as to why she was fired from her namesake show. She says it was not about that racist tweet against Obama White House advisor Valerie Jarrett. It was really about her voting record.

(BEGIN VIDEO)

ROSEANNE BARR, ACTOR: My show was cancelled before even one advertiser pulled out and I was labeled a racist. Why, you ask? The answer is simple. It's because I voted for Donald Trump and that is not allowed in Hollywood.

(END VIDEO)

PAUL: CNN Senior Media Correspondent, Oliver Darcy, following this story for us. Mr. Darcy, good to you. Fact check this for us would you please?

OLIVER DARCY, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: Good morning Christi.

PAUL: Good morning.

DARCY: You know I watched this clip last night and I must say it's not too surprising that Rosanne is going down the path. She is a conservative and I think for lot of conservatives, they felt that the media is biased against them or that Hollywood is made up of a whole bunch of liberals. And so not surprising she went down this path. It's worth noting that ABC did fire her for that racist tweet about Valerie Jarrett and it is also worth noting that they probably hired her because of her conservative credentials.

If you look back when Roseanne launched, Ben Sherwood, the president of ABC, gave an interview to the "New York Times" and talked about how they came up with the idea of relaunching Rosanne. And Sherwood had said that the ABC news executives after Trump's election had gotten together and realized there is this middle blue-collar electorate, this middle America, that if they could come up with a show that appealed to them, it might do well and Trump kind of had exposed that this electorate existed and it was underserved essentially.

So they decided to relaunch Roseanne effectively hiring Roseanne for her conservative credentials, for her appeal to the conservative base. So it's extremely odd that she's now deciding to claim that sshe was fired for that reason.

Paul: Well, where does the new show stand? Because I know there is a new show called "The Connors" right?

DARCY: Right.

PAUL: And that -- has that gone into production? How realistic to make air without Rosanne?

DARCY: Right and that show is moving on without Rosanne, I think more evidence that she was perhaps not fired because of her conservative credentials. The show is still appealing to Middle America and they want to keep it on ABC. It is worth noting this isn't the only video that Rosanne posted yesterday. She posted this out hinged outburst and she talked about the racist tweets that got her fired from ABC. Why don't we take a listen to that?

(BEGIN VIDE0)

ROSEANNE BARR, ACTOR: I'm trying to talk about Iran. I'm trying to talk about Valerie Jarrett with the Iran deal.

UNKNOWN MALE: I know but you've told me this 300 times. Do you know that...

BARR: That's what my tweet was about.

UNKNOWN MALE: I know. You've explained this literally 300 times.

BARR: I thought that (beep) was white. (Beep). I thought the (beep) was white.

(END VIDEO)

DARCY: I think that might add some contest to what Roseanne is doing. It's not clear maybe if she's trying to get attention with these really unhinged outbursts that she's posting online or what the deal is but I think it's pretty safe to say that she was hired for her conservative credentials and probably not fired for them.

PAUL: All right, Oliver Darcy, we appreciate you bringing it to us. Thank you so much. We'll be right back.

DARCY: Thank you.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:50:00]

BLACKWELL: Twenty million people across the southeast are facing threats from tornadoes this weekend.

PAUL: Meteorologist Allison Chinchar is tracking it all from Atlanta. Well apparently we just had some wild weather blow through.

ALLISON CHINCHAR, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yes, it was quite the lightning show out there, lots of flashes of lightening, torrential downpours as times. The good news the storm system moved through relatively quickly but here's the thing, it's got other places to go. So we have been tracking where this system is going. Now just in the last 24 hours, this system has produced three tornado reports; over 80 hail reports, several of those baseball-sized hail or larger; and then over 160 wind reports and that's likely to continue as this system pushes down to the south and east.

There you can see we have a severe thunderstorm watch in effect for that area in yellow but cities like Charlotte, Colombia, Atlanta are all going to be under the threat today. Why? Because we have two rounds, the one that's already moved through some of these cities and another one that will be coming back this afternoon. So all of these cities you see here in yellow have the potential for those damaging winds, the large hail and yes we cannot rule out the potential for an isolated tornado.

Here you see that first round moving through and then more of those cells firing up as we go later into the afternoon, mainly after say about 2:00 - 3:00 this afternoon and carrying through the overnight hours. Heavy rain is also going to be a factor because some of the areas are going to get hit twice. So keep in mind while most areas get less than two inches of rain guys, you could have you some that get more than four.

BLACKWELL: Oh, all right. Allison thanks.

PAUL: So let me ask you a question. Are you upset or disappointed by some of the things that President Trump does? Then according to some folks, you may be suffering from quote, "Trump Derangement Syndrome." Here's CNN's Jeannie Moos.

JEANNIE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The summit pushed Trump critics over the edge in their disdain for the President's behavior.

GOLDBERG: I very rarely lose my cool but I also don't like being accused of being hysterical.

(END VIDEO)

MOOS: TDS is nothing new. Fifteen years ago someone coined the term Bush Derangement Syndrome, which was followed by Obama Derangement Syndrome and now...

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ANTHONY SCARAMUCCI, FORMER WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: She's got a little bit of that Trump Derangement Syndrome hoping that one of these comedians will come up with an anti-anxiety medication for these liberals. You just take one table a day, maybe a suppository, and take it easy.

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[08:55:00]

MOOS: But who needs a suppository when Jimmy Kimmel has a cure.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you feel like the world is out to get you? You may be suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome. Ask your doctor about ReZign and get you back to living the life you used to love.